Keep It Simple

Image Source: https://summitlife.org/keep-it-simple-summit-life-today/

So, it has been about two weeks or so since I last wrote a blog entry. Am I burned out? Have I lost the desire to blog? Nope, I’ve just been doing 2 major things (and a lot of minor things) that have taken my time away from blogging. So, work has been constant this summer and where I might have had an hour or two to blog in other summers, I’m usually working in the mornings and afternoons, so this obviously means I don’t have as much time for blogging that I might under other circumstances. However, more than that I’ve been 1) reorganizing the way I write/create my stories, and 2) working on my dissertation. I’ve talked a little bit about the first point already, but I really want to tackle the second point today.

The 29 Page Introduction

So, if you’ve read the heading above, you’ll know that my Introduction is 29 pages long. Except it isn’t. You see, even for a dissertation, 29 pages is extraordinarily long. Thanks to feedback I received, I realized that I wasn’t really writing an introduction (which is what I’d been working on most of the summer), but rather I’d actually been writing the beginning of one of my chapters. Now, I’ve been working on and off on this 29 page “section” for the better part of the summer. This is the reason why many days I’ve just not had the desire to blog–after putting 250 words (minimum–it’s usually closer to 500 words) per session, there’s just not a whole lot of impetus sit down and knock out another 500-750 words for the blog–although I’m working to change that, starting this week.

Why 29 Pages?

I started out on the Introduction shortly after the TPA Conference wrapped up in late February/early March. I got pretty far by the time the Spring Semester started, but for some reason, after reading over it, and other examples of dissertations, I didn’t feel like mine was very good. So, I thought, “Right, let’s just start over and do this right.” In essence, I’d let the “inner critic” take over too soon. So, I came up with a more elaborate plan, and really dug deep into the events of last summer (summer 2020) in the United States in order to set the stage for what I was planning on covering and why it was important. This is where the 29 pages comes from.

Where’s the Beef?

However, when I gave it to the University Writing Center (UWC), while I was given good feedback on it, one of the consultants asked, where’s the Afrofuturism part. This wasn’t a knock–just an (astute) observation! I continued to write, but alarm bells began ringing in the back of my mind and I felt like I was going on the wrong path. I decided to look at other dissertations in my area, but more specifically, ones that were published by my school and they were much shorter than what I was working on.

Pivoting for the Win

So, I’ve spent the past week, revising and rewriting my Introduction. I haven’t thrown away the 29 pages that I wrote, just copied the material to Chapter 4, so I will have a head start for that chapter. What I’ve learned from this process, however, is that I have a tendency to “over complicate” things. I seem to think that “simple” = “too simple” and therefore = “bad.” However, I know from experience that this isn’t always the case. I used to be into Role Playing Games (RPGs)–collecting them and (when I was a teenager) playing them. Aliens RPG, based on the Aliens movie was one that I managed to find (unfortunately, I gave it away along with about 25 other fairly rare RPGs). However, I remember that it was SO complex that it would have been nearly impossible to run. I may be confusing it with another RPG, but I also remember it as being “deadly” in that the rules were so lethal to characters, getting hit in combat and failing a roll would have maimed or killed characters left, right, and center.

My point with the Aliens RPG is that the game, while complex, complicated, and reflecting a fairly large amount of reality, wouldn’t have been much fun. It would have been a slog–the game was really more of a nice sourcebook than an actual game. I innately know that complicated doesn’t always mean better, but there’s always this striving for perfection in me that sometimes makes me turn the simple into the complicated.

Luckily, due to some insightful questioning by one of my friends/colleagues here at MTSU, I was able to pivot before I’d gotten too far in the weeds. I’m really going to have to work on the KISS model: Keep It Simple, Sidney!

Sidney

Please consider supporting these fine small press publishers where my work has appeared:

Read Skin Deep for Free at Aurora WolfRead Childe Roland for Free at Electric SpecPurchase  HawkeMoon  on Amazon.com (Paperback) or eBookPurchase  Dragonhawk  on Amazon.com (Paperback) or KindlePurchase  WarLight  on Amazon.com (Paperback) or KindlePurchase  Ship of Shadows  on Amazon.com (Paperback) or KindlePurchase  Faerie Knight  on Amazon.com (Paperback) or KindleCurrently Working On (July 2021):Unhallowed (Weird Western Story)
2021 Revision: Completed; Out to Market.Starlight, Starbright (Science Fiction Story)
2021 Revision: Completed.The Independent (Science Fiction Story)
2021 Revision: Completed; Out to Market.To Dance the Sea of Storms (Fantasy Story)
Prewrite: Completed, Plan & Outline: Completed, Write a first draft: Completed, Revision: In Progress.